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A Fire of Turf, Op 139

Introduction

The County Wexford poetess, Winifred Letts, published her first set of poems, Songs from Leinster, in 1913. Stanford evidently read the poems soon after they were in print, for in July of the same year he completed A Sheaf of Songs from Leinster and, a month later, A Fire of Turf, a subsection of Letts’s larger collection. A Fire of Turf consisted of nine poems of which Stanford set seven, leaving out only ‘Voices’ (No 3) and ‘Questions’ (No 6); the remaining poems were set in their existing order with the exception of The Fair (originally No 4) which was placed sixth. Though Letts’s verse is not especially distinguished, the message and world of her poetry clearly struck a chord with Stanford. Nostalgic for a world that was fast disappearing, and for an Ireland remembered vividly from his youth (albeit idyllically), the composer clearly experienced a fascination for the colours, smells and sounds of Letts’s Hiberno-English dialect which, for him, were powerful creative stimulants with a deeply personal (one might even say autobiographical) overlay.

Central to A Fire of Turf are the passing seasons of the year, the changing winds, the supremacy of nature and (in true Hardyesque fashion) its oblivion to man. On a human level this is paralleled in the phases of a man’s life, which, with the rapid passing of time (symbolised in the blowing of the winds), sees our protagonist dream of his past existence through childhood, youth, love and old age, from summer’s energy to winter’s reflection, memories kept alive by the heat and glow of the turf. This lies at the heart of the first song, A Fire of Turf, a broad lyrical exposition, muscular yet tender in sentiment.

The second song, The Chapel on the Hill, is one of Stanford’s gentle modal meditations infused with elements of traditional Irish melody. At first we are filled with the impressions of pastoral childhood innocence, of religious piety and communal security, but all this is quietly unsettled by sexual awakening as, replete with tierce de Picardie, ‘the noonday sunshine [is] caught in Mary Connor’s hair’.

Having established a tonal base of D for the first two songs, Stanford subtly lifts the third song, Cowslip Time, up a semitone to E flat major, a shift underpinning the optimistic, new-found warmth of spring and the symbolism of perennial fertility.

In the relative minor, Scared provides an entertaining foil with its melodrama, ghosts and ‘things that go bump in the night’, though aside from its humorous badinage it obliquely suggests the uncertainties and unexpected turns that life may bring.

As a counterpart to Cowslip Time, the melodically euphonious Blackberry Time captures a day of arduous travelling, of collecting blackberries in the country and selling them in the town. As with so many of Stanford’s strophic songs, an ostensibly simple design is, in detail, highly sophisticated. In this instance the composer suspends the entire structure above a dominant pedal (bringing resolution only in the final bar), thus equating the sense of musical continuity with the central theme of ceaseless and fatiguing travel. There is also a subtle matrix of harmonic variegation, notably in the augmented fourth verse (‘We traipis round from door to door’) and at the climax of the last (‘Och! sure the thought of home’) which, as part of a rich, fertile diatonic idiom, must have been influential on the emerging Ivor Gurney.

In The Fair there is a sense of gaiety and prosperity as our couple arrive in their ‘fine new ass-and-cart’ before the people ‘kilt with envy’. Elements of modality, notably the potent Dorian E minor that obliquely begins the song and colours the penultimate phrase of each verse (‘with pride and joy of heart’), lend a spirit of folksong to the ditty, and there is much in common with Stanford’s well-known folksong arrangement, Trottin’ to the Fair, in the distinctive subdominant close to all four verses, leaving the piano to provide the cadence.

The final song of the cycle, The West Wind, is by far the most discursive and substantial composition. Cast in three sections, it depicts the wild wind from the Atlantic as it hurls itself against the landscape and our protagonist’s plea for rest. This turbulence (a metaphor for life’s eternal struggle) is vividly imparted in the central paragraph which embarks from D minor (the tonal centre of the first two songs). Departure from D, however, is marked with conspicuous rapidity as the tonality shifts chromatically upwards, a tendency absent from the rest of the cycle. Framing this stormy passage are two sections of more lyrical inclination in F major, the first contemplating the peace of a tranquil autumn, and the second a gentle postlude full of reflection and release, as well as a passing valedictory reference to the opening song.

Recordings

'Beautifully performed with excellent notes, this recording will convince even the sceptical of the true worth of these songs … a most sensitive ...'Maintains in each and every bar the high standards of the previous release' (BBC Music Magazine)» More

This album is not yet available for downloadHYP202CDs Super-budget price sampler — Deleted

'More than just a highlight sampler. This is a classy collection, brought together with a great deal of care and attention to musical programming seldom found in this kind of CD … A stocking-filler any music lover would appreciate' (Scotland ...» More

The chapel of my childhood Is on the green hill-side, And in the long grass up the hill The graves of them that’s died. My mother often took me When I was young and small; I’d kneel upon her skirts and count The Stations on the wall.

Each evening in the Maytime The rosary we’d say: You’d hear beyant the chapel wall The corncrakes in the hay. The flowers round the altar, They made the air smell sweet, And cool the chapel floor would be To little childher’s feet.

It’s scarce a day was passing But there I’d be a while: I mind the way the boys’ bare feet Went patting up the aisle. The girls would come from lessons And kneel to say a prayer. You’d see the noonday sunshine caught In Mary Connor’s hair.

God bless the time when cowslips grow High and low, high and low; When never a place you’re like to pass, But there’s cowslips deep in the meadow grass; Over the rath* when the winds do blow They’re swinging and nodding to and fro. Oh it’s well to be young when the cowslips grow!

Old age will come – what matter so? High and low, high and low The cowslips shine when the spring comes round, In ev’ry meadow and patch of ground. And you’ll watch your childher’s childher go Off to the fields where the spring winds blow. Oh! It’s well for the world when the cowslips grow!

These dusky evenings in December I do be scared with sudden fright, So many things you’d dis-remember Shows quare an’ darkish in the night. Sure kilt you’d be if a dog should bark, Or an old cow wheeze in the lonesome dark; For who can tell who is in it at all, With the Tax man murdered there by the wall, An’ the druidy stone foreninst the wood, Where you’d maybe see what isn’t good. An’ the haunted house. Och! Glory be, There’s a power of terrible things you’d see In the dark.

I’m feared itself lest some black stranger Would step behind me on the grass; Or goodness knows what sudden danger Might lep upon me as I pass. For strange an’ lonesome the roads do seem Like a far-off place you’d see in a dream; An’ you’d never know who you’d meet at the turn, Old crazy Nelly or mad John Byrne, Or the headless one that wrings her hands, Where the old deserted cabin stands, Or the fairy dog. Och! Glory be, There’s a power of terrible things you’d see In the dark.

In blackberry time herself and me We do be up by the break of day, An’ ‘God go with us now’ says she, ‘The time we’re thrav’llin’ on our way, An’ God go with us all the while We’re thrav’llin’on from mile to mile.’

‘Tis up Glencullen way we are; The berries there is fine and sweet, But kilt you’d be, it is so far, When you go thrav’llin’on your feet. Och, weary miles ere you’d come down From far Glencullen to the town.

Up there at dawn ‘tis quare and still And dew lies heavy on the ground, But berries for a basket’s fill Grows on the bushes all around. And whiles we’ll rest and eat a few That’s sodden with the heavy dew

We traipis round from door to door; ‘Tis weary in the noonday heat. (May God have mercy on the poor That thravels round upon their feet!) For sure you’re moidhered in the town, The way the carts go up and down.

But when we’re quit of all our load, ‘Now God be praised for that’ says she; And back we go the homeward road, Near bet we are, herself and me. Och! sure the thought of home is sweet To thim that thravels on their feet.

Oh! We’re off to the fair now the lot of us together, The yellow sunlight ev’rywhere – sure that’s the lovely weather! And amn’t I six foot high today with pride and joy of heart, The way I’m driving to the fair in a fine new ass-and-cart?

The pigs are screeching merrily at all the jolts and lurches, The wonder of the world we are from here until the Churches; And the speckly hen, poor decent bird, has lost her wits with scare, It’s well you know the noise she makes that we’re going to the fair.

The quality will stare when they see the way we’re driving, The polis stand in wonderment to watch the cart arriving; And the people that’s stravagin’ around the market square Will be kilt with envy when ourselves come driving to the fair.

But the best time of all is the time the evening closes, With the wind blowing from the south is sweet with wild hedge roses. And we’re counting out our money and proud and glad of heart The way we’re driving home again in our fine new ass-and-cart.